


Adventure Tales for Children

by missmollyetc



Series: Inspector Meets World [4]
Category: Lewis (TV), Sky Captain & the World of Tomorrow (2004)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Crack, Gen, for Sky Captain anyway
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-01
Updated: 2012-05-01
Packaged: 2017-11-04 15:39:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/395455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missmollyetc/pseuds/missmollyetc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In Lewis' house, there's a box he inherited as a boy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Adventure Tales for Children

**Author's Note:**

> For [revieloutionne](http://revieloutionne.livejournal.com/) Written for the prompt: "How is Dexter Dearborn related to Robbie Lewis?"

When the kids are small, their favorite stories are all Robbie's as well, because they're true and the best way he knows to shove the muck he often swims in at work as far from his mind as possible. Every evening, if he's back before Val's sent the children to bed, he settles in with a sigh, and waits for Our Lynn to to point out the (broken, of course) ray gun Lewis keeps on the mantel. He curls the kids close, puts his feet under--not atop, learned his lessons quick, he has--the coffee table, and lets himself remember.

Dex was his most favorite grandfather--not that he didn't love his grandda on the other side, but no brush salesman can compete with a man who fought alongside the Legion for Sky Captain. Not when half the time Dex was the only thing standing between Sky Captain--who Dex called Cap, while gramma rolled her eyes--and perdition. That had been what caught Robbie's heart as child, (what he sees light in his children's faces as he speaks) how cleverness won the day more often then fists ever did, and how Dex and Cap and Polly and Franky fought Totenkopf and his robots, and Gorgeous George, and helped beat back the Nazis, oh, and all the nasties of the world before teatime. How Dex built planes and robots, and ways to always find people when they got lost because his cleverness was never out matched by his heart. Sometimes, depending on the hour, he tells them about how Dex and Cap saved the world and sent Robbie all sorts of treasures from wherever they were, after Dex stopped living at home. Irks him, that, but he's old enough now to realize the the world was big even when he'd been small, and with more types of people than even big girls and boys could count. He likes to see that thought take root as well, and thinks maybe Dex would have smiled that crooked grin to know he's passed the lesson on down.

If the kids have been very good during the day, and Val has looked at her watch and kissed him on the forehead, and settled down across from them on the loveseat, then Robbie will let one of the kids take the box down from the shelf next to Val's china. He'll watch as they carefully place the box on the coffee table, and open the lid, and let them spend a few minutes running their hands over Uncle Cap's flight goggles, and Dex's compass, that still tells the time down to three seconds, and used to have a little torch come out the end before the light bulb cracked. Franky's rank insignia and Polly's camera take turns around the room, one childish dive into the sofa pretend-captured forever in the News of the World. Sooner or later, they'll run themselves out and lie on the couch, sharing the small photo album between them and telling Robbie who's who and what's what in every snap, just as if he's never seen them before. And when Val and he stand up, clapping their hands and repacking every item into its wooden home, they'll pout and whine all the way through teeth brushing to 'one more drink of water,' and finally, to bed. 

And when they're out like little lights, he'll put the carved wooden lid back on top of the box, and replace it on its shelf. Val will meet him at the end of the hallway, just before their bedroom. She'll press her kiss to the side of Robbie's mouth, and he'll think about the last story. The one he's saving for when the kids are grown up; about how Dex and Uncle Cap and Polly and Franky fought and laughed and could never bear to be parted from each other for long and how, at the end, they weren't.


End file.
